Maturing~A Fred Story
by Harriet Potter
Summary: Fred turns eighteen and decides to join the army to fight against Voldemort's army...He wants to be an adult, but in order to be one, it may take something he never expected...Very depressing!


A Fred Story

By: Harriet Potter

"If we could not laugh, we would all go insane."

-Jimmy Buffet

  
  


I've always have been and intend to be a practical joker. It's part of my personality, reputation, and all in all, my entire life. Not that I can't be serious-I just don't attempt to be, unless the occasion calls for it.

Unfortunately, things in my world are pretty serious at the time. You-Know-Who has risen back to power, and the wizarding world is in total chaos. I'm here at Hogwarts right now, but as I'm only seventeen, I can't be drafted for the wizarding army that is to fight in the upcoming battle against You-Know-Who's army. Shit, why don't I just say it-_Voldemort. _

So, like I said, I'm here at Hogwarts as we speak. It's May, and I'm looking forward to my eighteenth birthday this summer. You have to be eighteen to join the army, so I barely miss the deadline. I'm not happy about this, as I want to fight. I don't want to be a hero or a famous general or anything, I simply want to say that I did my part. I want to be able to say that I fought against Voldemort's army. But as my sister Ginny said, you can't fight an army of dark wizards with fake wands and Filibuster fireworks.

School is in distress, all considered. I wouldn't say that everyone is particularly _scared_, just alert. Voldemort's power hit us so damn hard last year, with the death of Cedric Diggory, and this year isn't even worth the trouble. We rarely leave the castle to do anything, and it's such a shame that my seventh year of school had to be spent this way. We can't even walk outside without a professor going with us. We play quidditch, but it's nothing like it used to be. Nobody comes to matches, other than the teams, and professors to supervise the games. It's pointless and stupid. Or, as my brother George put it, "a crock of shit." He has a point, I must admit. This isn't how I wanted to spend my final year at Hogwarts. I wanted to get into as much trouble as I could before entering the "adult world". But the way things are going right now, that's not going to happen. 

Right now, things are beginning to get every bit as horrible as they were fourteen years ago when Voldemort was big and bad and in power. My friend, Lee Jordan, got an owl the other day telling him that his uncle was killed. He's not the only one, though. Many people have had to leave school early, due to deaths in their families. Lots of people have left school simply because their families wanted them at home. It's a terrible situation, really, and I know what I have to do. Until I can join the army, I'm going to be myself, and not serious just because my situation is. Everyone could use some laughs right now.

*** 6 months later ***

"Pssst...Fred!"

I looked up from _How to Start Your Own Business_ to see who was whispering to me. I knew perfectly well that it was George, but he sounded strangely thrilled at something. He had his head stuck through a crack in the door to my room, and I could see the excitement in his eyes from across the room. It's a twin thing, I guess. You can tell what the other is feeling.

"What the hell do you want? It's one o'clock in the morning!"

Fred walked over towards my bed and grinned. It was the same grin he always had when he was up to something. It was the same grin I have, due to the fact that we are mirror images of each other.

"Oh, excuse me for disturbing Mr. Literary Genius." George muttered sarcastically. "What are you reading, anyway?"

I set the book down and laid it on my night stand. "_How to Start Your Own Business._ You oughta read it." George looked at me skeptically, so I added, "You know there's a lot of money involved with personal businesses." This seemed to capture his attention more than before, but I left it at that.

"What do you want, anyway?" I asked.

George looked at me for a moment as though I was crazy, then said, "Do you realize that you've been eighteen for an hour and haven't even realized it?"

My eyes grew wide. "How did I forget that today was my birthday?" I mumbled to myself.

George shrugged. "In any case, you do know what this means, don't you?"

"No, not really."

George rolled his eyes. "It means, my dear brother, that we are old enough to sell whatever we want, as in, fake wands, Canary Creams, etcetera. You're little business book might just come in handy."

I must have just sat there, because George looked at me very strangely. "Don't you get it?" he asked. " We're old enough to do whatever we want. We can make money, spend it, do whatever the hell we want to do. We're eighteen years old, and we don't have to live with our family forever."

I nodded, but I actually had other things on my mind. Many other things, for that matter. George talked on and on about how we could make some money and then get a nice apartment or something like that, but I wasn't paying attention. I was thinking about what I was going to tell my family first thing in the morning, and now that I was eighteen, they could do nothing to stop me.

"Fred, what is wrong with you?" George asked. I guess he had noticed my lack of attention.

I looked at George. "Oh, nothing. I'm just tired, that's all." Which wasn't even a lie, considering that I was very tired.

"Well, I'm gonna go to bed. You think about what I said." And with that, George walked out of the room.

I was thinking, but not about what George had just said. I was thinking about the war, and how I was now old enough to join the army. I fell asleep thinking about it. And I had set my mind to it-I was going to register for the army as soon as I could the next day.

****

"Get up, birthday boy!"

I opened my eyes groggily to see that my mum was standing right over me with a large platter of food in her arms. She had made George and me breakfast in bed on our birthdays for as long as I can remember, and I have to admit that quite enjoy it.

"Hey Mum." I said sleepily, stretching.

"Good morning, sleepyhead," she said as she opened the blinds that covered the window to my room, filling the room with light. "Eighteen years old. I just can't believe it."

I smiled and yawned. "You know what I think?" 

"What?"

"That since I'm eighteen years old and all, I should definitely get a bottle of firewhiskey and a trip to one of those things muggle boys go to-what are they called?"

"Topless bars, Fred!" interrupted George as he walked into the room in his pajamas.

"George Weasley!" Mum shrieked. George walked over to my bed and sat down at the edge, giving Mum a mischievous grin as he walked passed her.

"Mom, you've gotta lighten up. Listen, Fred and I need to talk to you about a little something." He shot me a serious look that told me to help him out, "See, we're and all now, and we were talking last night about what we could do with our lives now that we're adults."

Mum rolled her eyes at George. "You two will never be adults. I've heard this since you were fifteen years old, and with times like they are now, you aren't leaving the Burrow until things clear up." She swallowed and looked down. "And who knows? They may not clear up for quite a while."

I think I was still halfway asleep, but I could hear George and Mum arguing for about five minutes until Mum ended up yelling at George. I heard that.

"George, if you're such an adult, let's see how you can handle this. You-Know-Who is in power, and you're out living on your own. I don't care how smart you think you are, if You-Know-Who is after you, you're as good as dead. All it takes is two words and the swish of a wand. It's times like this that families need to be together, and no matter how old you may be, unless you're out there fighting in the army, you're going to be at the Burrow."

George just stared at my mom. For a fleeting second, I thought he might cry. I should've known better. George didn't like to cry, and neither did I.

George continued to look at Mum. I, however, rose from my bed, ignoring my breakfast, and started towards the door. What my mother had just said reminded me of what I was supposed to do today.

"Where are you going, Fred?" my mum called irritably.

"Downstairs. I need to talk to dad."

"Fred Weasley, you heard what I just said. Don't you go bugging him. He's got enough on his plate at the time, and he's going to tell you the exact same thing that I said."

But I was already out the door.

****

My dad was eating breakfast at the table with Ginny and Ron when I walked into the kitchen. If there's one thing I love about our house, it's the kitchen. It's so bright. It almost always puts me in a good mood to walk into our kitchen. Right now, though, I didn't even notice.

"Dad, I need to talk to you," I said seriously.

Dad looked up from his paper and set his coffee down and smiled at me. Maybe he thought I was trying to lead him into something by being serious.

"Of course, Mr. Eighteen-Year-Old. What do you want?"

I swallowed hard. I didn't want Ginny and Ron to hear me say this, but I figured they would find out soon enough anyway.

"Dad, I want to join the army. I'm eighteen and legal, so there's nothing you can do to stop me, either."

Whatever my dad had expected me to say, this wasn't it. His mouth dropped, but he closed it immediately. 

"That's noble Fred, that's very noble, but son, you don't want to be involved with this war if you don't have to be. You're lucky that you're birthday falls where it does. In fact, all of our family has been extremely lucky not to have gotten involved with the war. And I...well, I just don't want you to get hurt."

I looked at my dad like I had never looked at him before. He was scared. It had always been the other way around, with me being the scared child and he being the father. But not now. He was scared for me. It made me almost back down to see my dad like this.

But I didn't.

"Dad, I'm going. And if I do get hurt, so be it. I'll die fighting for what I believed in." I was proud of what I had just said. It was probably the most intelligent thing I had ever said to my dad.

My Dad had a blank expression on his face. I heard my mum and George walk down the stairs. I looked at Ron and Ginny, who had stopped eating breakfast and were looking at me with wide eyes.

"Fred," my dad said, "I understand what you're saying. It's a wonderful, noble thing, but think logically. What are the chances of you seeing your nineteenth birthday?" 

I just stood still and looked him straight in the eyes.

"Son, I don't want you to go off to war. In fact, I would do anything to stop it, but like you said, I can't stop you. It's you're decision." With that, he walked down the hall that led to he and my mum's room. It was then that I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned and saw my twin brother looking at me with utmost respect.

"I'll go with you," he said.

****

Ginny was in tears on the day George and I left. Ron had a deadened look in his eyes, but we told him that school would keep him busy until we got back. Mum gave us hugs and tried to hide her tears as Ginny could not. Dad wasn't there when we left. Some major catastrophe had struck in London, so he was busy at the Ministry. Mum said that he respected us for our decision. He said that we made him proud, as much as he didn't want to see us go.

I remember looking back at the Burrow one last time before George and I touched the Portkey that would take us to the Army Base. I almost wanted to cry, but I didn't. I felt like an adult for the first time in my life, and strangely enough, I didn't feel free at all. I felt scared.

"Fred, did you know that you get to drink lots of beer in the army? I watched an American muggle movie about a war once, and all they did when they weren't fighting was drink!" George exclaimed and broke my train of thought.

"Maybe we'll fight so well that they'll send us to one of those...oh you know...what are they called again?" I muttered, waiting to be pulled away by the Portkey.

"Topless bars," replied George.

"Right. Topless Bars. That can be our goal-fight good and go to a topless bar." I said, being my old self on a serious day. I felt a sudden jerk behind my navel, and was quickly pulled forward. 

We were on our way.

****One month later****

"Weasley!"

George and I looked at each other and grinned. This getting-yelled-at business was beginning to become second nature to us. Today, it just so happened that we had "accidentally" let a bottle of Notta-Baldy's Magical Hair Growing potion slip into one of our base mate's shampoo. We peeped out of a crack in our tent, waiting for a full-grown man with waist-length hair run towards our tent in a bath towel. 

It wasn't a full-grown man who came trudging toward our tent; on the contrary, it was an _extremely_ full-grown man who just so happened to be our Sargent. 

I looked at George as my mouth dropped.

"Oh shit," was all I could manage to say before the flaps of our tent burst open.

  
  


****

Despite the fact that our Sargent is an asshole, and we got many compliments for our little prank, my arms are still cramped from push-ups, my legs are still extremely sore from running, and the blisters on my hands and feet are indescribably painful.

Not that we didn't do this kind of thing everyday; we did.

Just not like this. I swear, I think that if our Sargent had had a baseball bat when he burst into our tent, he would have knocked our heads right off of our shoulders. But, since he didn't, he simply made us do a "few extra things" as he said.

A few my arse. I wanted to tell him to run up and down a hill sixty times and see how he liked it. He seemed to read my mind as he explained that he was going to run it with us, "to keep us on track." Then he explained how he used to run on the Wizarding Olympiad's Cross Canyon team. 

After that, it was "push-up time." Maybe things would have gone a little better had I not asked if this had anything to do with a push-up bra.

Then we had to do some war-like obstacle course, specially designed for the "delinquents", which we assumed were people like George and myself. Things were fine on this until George started hanging off one of the ropes and imitating a monkey. That's when he fell off.

Anyway, like I said, neither me nor George are in the best of moods right now. On top of that, Voldemort's army is getting closer and closer to where we are now. I'm actually nervous, if you want to know the truth. 

I'm beginning to get used to army life. It's kind of nice to be away from home, but in a place where you still have authorities. Some days I do miss my family. Some days I'm ready to fight. I'm afraid that I'm going to be fighting much sooner than I'm going to be seeing my family.

***1 week later****

Things were getting a little scary at this point, as we walked down an old dirt road. We had our wands out and ready incase of a surprise attack. We were headed for battle, as soon as we joined forces with another troop. 

I didn't think that I was ready for this.

***2 days later****

"George!"

I looked frantically around for my brother, unable to spot him through the masses of new faces. We had met up with the new troops. We were now in battle.

This was worse than I had ever imagined. All around me, people were falling out dead by the hands of dark wizards. I had only one thought on my mind. _Get to George._

I ran as quickly as I could, dodging spells, curses, hexes. Probably even Avada Kedavra. I didn't really care what happened to me, as long as I got to my brother first. 

I don't remember how we were separated. I just knew that I had to get to George. It was because of me that he had come here in the first place; I didn't want his death to be because of me.

I stopped, wand in hand, and stood in one spot, twisting my head around in order to spot George. That's when I saw his hair.

He seemed to be looking for something. He was standing right under a large tree, craning his neck. 

"George!" I yelled at the top of my lungs. He heard me.

"Fred!" he called back. I began to run towards him immediately.

Just then, out of nowhere, ropes suddenly seized both of George's wrists and ankles. He snapped back against the large tree, hanging not two feet from the ground.

"No! Let him down!" I screamed, crying.

From behind the tree, the source of the ropes from which my brother hung emerged. A tall, hooded, dark wizard walked slowly out into the open, then turned towards George, wand outstretched.

I knew what was about to happen.

"Nooooo!" I screamed, and I suddenly began running.

"Avada Kedav-" croaked the voice of the dark wizard. That's when I leapt into the air, blocking the spell from my brother. In a flash of green light, I looked at my brother in midair and saw his astonished face.

That was the last thing that I ever saw.

***

Don't cry for me. There was enough of that at my funeral. I hated to see people get that upset. I wished that I could have made them laugh and smile as I had done so many times before.

Ginny was hysterical as my coffin was laid into the ground. Ron couldn't look; his lip quivered as he held Ginny.

Percy wept silently alongside Penelope Clearwater, his wife. Bill held Mum as she bawled loudly into a handkerchief. Charlie stood with his head in his hands as my dad patted him on the back, tears streaming down his face.

George, however, didn't cry. He simply stood away from my coffin and bit his bottom lip. He knew that I wouldn't have wanted him to cry. I think it was another one of those understanding between twins.

Everyone commented to my family how brave and noble I was as they left the cemetery. The funny thing is, I didn't feel brave. I didn't feel noble, either. The only feeling I got was one that I had never felt before in all my life.

I felt like an adult.

  
  
  
  


A/N: I want everyone to understand that I love Fred, and I don't want him to die! This is the total result of what a bad day will do to you! I failed a Geometry test, lost my basketball game, and then tried to bury my sorrows by eating! I shouldn't even post this, but I'm going to anyway. By the way, I have no idea what the base camp of a British Army is like, so I just set it up like an American army. I hope you don't mind. Maybe you'll like it. Review, anyway. More of the Ultimate Year by Monday, I PROMISE!!!

All of these characters belong to J.K. Rowling.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



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